Hold Me Back
by surrealist-notions
Summary: Haymitch attends the party held the first night of the hunger games, and how it was very different from the years before.


**I saw a headcanon like this on tumblr a few months ago and it's been playing on my mind ever since. I finally gave up and ended up writing about it. I'm sorry I can't remember who the headcanon was done by, but if I could I would give you all the awards. **

**But anyway, just a one chapter short story. Enjoy.**

The first night was always the hardest to watch when you were a mentor for the hunger games. Well, usually for other mentors. Tributes of the lower districts were usually killed off today so that the real games could begin for the serious players. And this year, there was no exception. Most mentors took it hard when a tribute from there district died. Heck, we all did. We all knew what it was like.

Though I had usually had a different outlook. After I won my hunger games, and became one of districts twelves only winner and therefore, mentor, I started off trying to give the kids advice. But they were all so scared. And the captiol didn't give them a chance. So they were usually killed off on this day as well. After my fourth year of hunger games mentoring I decided there was no need to stay sober any longer whilst the hunger games were on. It made no difference to the kids. They weren't going to win.

This year, however, was different. I had a pair of tributes that didn't want to wallow in their grief that they were coming to their final days. They wanted to stay alive. Especially the girl. The girl was very different. She had a spark in her. She had anger. And I saw for the first time since I started mentoring a potential winner of the hunger games from district twelve. And the boy, the boy was had a spark as well, but it wasn't the spark he needed. He loved the girl. And as much as I hated it, I knew I had to play his love up and show it to the world. It was after the first train ride that I knew I had to cut back on the drinks. Even if it meant pain for myself, these kids had something in them.

So the room where we're invited to on the night of the first hunger games has a different feel to it. There were the usual mentors who were watching the games so they could know what was going on and how they're tributes were doing. There were the mentors who had left after their kids had been killed with a solemn 'see you next year'. This year I was on the mentors that stayed because, well, I didn't have a reason to leave.

I was watching the screens every now and again to see what was happening. They featured the girl a lot. I knew they would. The capitol loved the pair from district twelve. I just hoped that was the right thing to do.

Only mentors weren't the only ones invited. There were high profile citizens of the capitol, ones with money coming out of their pockets that could feed a whole district for a year. Snow sometimes attended, but rumour had it he preferred watching the games in privacy. I hated when snow came. The look he used to give me said a thousand words. I hated that man with everything I had. I was glad he hadn't attended this years.

I was on my third whisky when I turned to the screens to see Katniss again, climbing a tree to bunker down in for the night. She was a smart girl. Suddenly someone was beside me, watching as well. I didn't like company.

"Pretty girl that one. You're her mentor right?" A man said, and I recognised him from other years. He was one of the high profile capitol citizens. I nodded, and took a swig of my whisky. Katniss was still the star on the screen.

"If she wins, how much for a night with her?" he said, and I turned to him. He was looking at the screen with greedy eyes that were surrounded in thick eyeliner and blue mascara. It was people like him who made me want to take down the capitol for all it was worth.

His face might have been pretty before I set down my glass and punched him full on. He stumbled back, surprised, and fell on the floor. He held his bleeding nose while I moved down to him.

"Scum like you don't deserve a woman like that." I growled at him. He narrowed his eyes as much as his swollen face allowed.  
>"You're just another scum from the districts. You may have won the games once but you will always just be the scum of our country, just like your other people." He hissed, and someone had the right mind to hold me back before I tore him to pieces. It was Finnick, another mentor.<br>"Let it go, Haymitch. Let it go." He said, using all his strength to hold me back.

I was then told I was not allowed to drink for the rest of the night.

But nothing stopped me from when I got back to the hotel.


End file.
